


Burnout

by bocje_ce_ustu



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bickering, Boy How Do You Stand These Dorks, Hank McCoy Needs a Medal, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Infidelity, Jealousy, M/M, Multi, Mutual Pining, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Telepathic Sex, Threesome, X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), of sorts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-15
Updated: 2017-12-15
Packaged: 2019-02-13 23:49:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12995214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bocje_ce_ustu/pseuds/bocje_ce_ustu
Summary: Since Logan had told him they would need to break Erik out of the Pentagon, Charles had known things would go to hell. He just hadn't expected them to go quite like this.





	Burnout

**Author's Note:**

  * For [citrinesunset](https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrinesunset/gifts).



They didn’t have time. A comforting thought, actually, because it meant it would all be over soon. He wouldn’t even get the chance to make a fool of himself.

Get Erik, get out, drop Pietro off and fly to Paris.

Well, he might actually need to lock himself in the toilet or something, should Erik make an attempt at small talk. Ah, locks. As if.

Panic had him again. If Erik decided he wanted to talk, Charles wouldn’t stop him. He couldn’t.

No, he didn’t want to. He wouldn’t let decade-old ghosts have the better of him. He would tell him that much. He would tell him that there was no way he was going back into his head, not now, not ever.

With the words clear in his head, he made his way towards the elevator. And almost slipped when the floor rearranged under his feet.

“What the fuck’s going on?”

He turned - _poor, poor decision_ \- to see Logan gripping one of the metal shelves for support and soon regretting it, as it seemed to shake even worse than the rest.

“Hell if I know.” He had to brace himself against the external frame of the elevator to insert the key. The key completed a turn before it stuck, and it took a lot of additional swearing and Charles almost landing face-down on the floor to unblock it and twist it all the way.

Charles’s walkie-talkie chose that moment to beep furiously. Hank’s tone on the other side was nothing near comforting, nor were his words. “The building is collapsing. What are you doing?”

“What do you mean, collapsing?”

“It looks like it’s caving in on its--- Char---, d-do you h--- ee? Get o-o-out n--”

The connection broke off and the device crackled unpromisingly, a thin line of smoke rising from it. Just moments later the whole room shook as if by a seizure and a distorted ping rang through the air.

The elevator creaked open with pained screeches, and out zoomed Pietro, both arms winded around a barely conscious Erik.

“Dude scared the pants off me. I had to do something.”

Erik’s head lolled on Pietro’s shoulder, causing another room-wide seizure. The boy's head itself seemed to follow the movement, bending awkwardly at the frame of his goggles, and the lapels of his jacket stood upright, as if they were trying to detached themselves from the whole.

That, paired with a strange pull and growing uncomfortable warmth at his belt and wristwatch, made Charles realize what was going on.

“It’s his powers. They’re out of control.”

All around them, even the slabs and racks full of metal tools looked dangerously inclined, every little component intensely vibrating, a giant arrow pointing towards Erik.

“We need to get out and find Hank,” Charles cried out over the increasingly ominous rattling of metal. “He’ll reverse the effects of the serum so I can fix this.”

“What do we do until then?”

“Until then…” Charles’s fist collided with Erik’s jaw.

***

Erik woke up to an ache pulsating through his skull and jaw, his powers a quiet lull at the back of his conscience.

They were near enough that he could make sense of his surroundings - seats, rows of seats, the familiar shape and noise of a plane - but even if he struggled to call them forth, they kept staying there, just out of reach. There like the two hands pressing unhurried circles on his temples, and the soft, warm surface his head lay on.

His eyes opened to find an unrelenting blue gaze trained on him, and as the world came back, Erik knew why his powers didn’t.

“Last time…” he croaked, looking up from Charles’s lap “our positions were reversed.”

A sliver of a smile made a quick apparition on Charles’s lips.

“We haven’t seen each other in ten years and you’re already talking dirty to me?”

_Solitary can do things to you_ , he wanted to say, but he didn’t want to go there so soon. “You know, it’d be easier if you just… cut the access to my powers.”

“Isn’t that why we ended up here in the first place?”

“That I don’t know. Ten years and you’ve never come for me. Why now?”

“I’m not here for you, Erik. Thanks for reminding me of your superior self-conceit, though.”

“Anytime.”

“We’re here for Raven,” came Hank’s voice from the pilot’s seat.

“She’s not with me. I haven’t seen her since Dallas.”

“We figured as much,” a gruff voice cut in. On the other side of the corridor, slouching comfortably in his seat, was a burly man with lots of hair and not one good idea of what to make of it. Erik thought he looked familiar, but couldn’t recall when or where they might have met before.

“Who is he?”

“Logan. We’ll come back to that.”

“Raven is about to kill Trask, a scientist working on a new type of machine for the extermination of mutants. Her actions are going to kick start a chain of events leading up to horror and destruction for both mutant and humankind.”

“And you know all that because...”

The stranger with the stranger hair – Logan, apparently – made a bored hand wave. “I’m from the future.”

“Right.” Erik dropped his head again on Charles’s legs, feeling that, if that was the moment he realized that was all a new convoluted type of dream, at least he ought to enjoy its benefits. “And what do you need me for?”

“Apparently, our future selves decided it took both of us together on the same side to convince Raven to give up her plans,” Charles explained, his lips curled into an expression that spoke of his opinion on the matter.

Erik couldn’t hold it anymore. His laughter rang through the inside of the plane, causing a chorus of agreement in the walls.

“So let me get this straight: some guy supposedly from the future tells you the world’s doomed if Raven delivers us from one of the hundreds of men with the will and means to massacre us, and you think I’m going to help talk her out of it? I’d gladly keep him still as she does it.”

Charles’s hands tensed around his temples. After a few moments he spoke, his voice eerily calm, “That’s why I was thinking we might have to revise our plan. We cannot hope to pass unnoticed if Erik keeps beckoning to every piece of metal out there.”

Logan leaned forward in his seat. “What do you suggest?”

“I stay behind with him in Westchester, and you and Hank go to Paris and stop her.”

“Way to fulfill your future self’s plans,” Erik cut in.

“Excuse me if your future self forgot to mention you’d be a danger to anyone and anything in your path.”

“As if you didn’t know that already.”

Charles didn’t reply. His gaze had turned inward, and from the way the plane had a sudden loss of height that made him jolt on his seat, Erik had a feeling he knew what conversation was unfolding.

Logan was looking out of the window, unfazed.

It took a while before Charles came back, a space of time Erik had spent peering up at all the minor changes of expression in his face, an activity facilitated by Charles’s eyes fluttering close after a while.

As soon as he opened them again, Charles looked about to speak. Then, probably realizing Logan had drifted off to sleep reclined back in his seat, he thought better of it and fixed a determined stare on the window.

“Is having my head in your lap part of the trick?”

“It keeps my legs warm. So, in a way…”

“Your feet are going to be cold, though. Can I get up?”

“Suit yourself.”

With Charles’s grounding presence tagging along in the back of his mind, Erik ventured along the corridor to find a blanket. He did find one on the fourth or fifth try, giving in to the nagging sensation he ought to look into the bottom left shelf, but not before digging out an old chessboard, stashed into the top right corner, and an expensive-looking bottle of brandy with two tumblers.

With his arms full of that satisfying loot, Erik made his way back along the corridor. Putting down everything except the blanket, he went over to Charles to arrange it over his legs. Charles made a noise of protest, swatting Erik’s hands away and tucking the blanket around his thighs himself. “I can handle it.”

As he straightened, Erik’s face almost brushed against Charles’s. This up close, the familiar spray of freckles on Charles’s nose was clearly visible. Not finding a valid reason why he shouldn’t, he let the swell of warmth coming with that discovery wash over their connection. The flush creeping over Charles’s cheeks was worth it.

“I don’t doubt it.” Erik crouched in front of him and took off Charles’s shoes as gently as he could, setting them aside and tucking the blanket under Charles’s socked feet.

“I’m not biting.” Charles had his brow twisted into a scowl, even as his eyes shone with an emotion that threatened to bleed through into Erik’s mind. “If you think this is enough to make me drop my guard, you’re wrong.”

“You’re going to have to rest eventually. Good luck stopping me then.”

“Trust me, the lack of sleep does wonders to my selfishness.”

Erik handed him the board. “Since you need to stay awake anyway...”

Charles accepted the offer with a wry smile and began to set the board, while Erik poured the brandy.

***

Charles wheeled outside and paused to close the door behind himself. On the other side, tucked in his old bed, Erik was a few breaths away from falling into a peaceful slumber. Charles was so damned tired himself he wasn’t sure it wasn’t induced. He couldn’t help a little smile at that, which he directed to Hank, leaning against the wall just across the door. Hank took that as the cue to bounce off the wall and follow Charles to his room.

“How are you holding up?”

That was Hank. Straight to the point on the surface, a million tiny tweaks to the fine machinery deep down.

“I’m about two seconds from yelling at the walls to shut up, if that even makes sense.”

Hank opened the door and slipped inside after him.

“That bad?”

Charles swallowed the first couple of answers that came to mind and set on _I’ve been worse._

Hank didn’t reply. Besides, his train of thought had completely derailed, taking turns Charles didn’t like in the least.

_Oh, please. Don’t even get me started on that._

“I have eyes, Charles. I know what I saw. All it took was one minute in his head and you’re ten years younger.”

Ah, the time-old debate. Will they. Won’t they. Charles had grown attached to the notion of Erik in a plastic prison if nothing else because that might be the only way to keep Hank from wondering if what they had was genuine. Some days, though, it still seemed like Hank thought Charles would have a plastic wheelchair made to match Erik’s plastic cell.

“You think one minute with him would make me forget what he’s put me through?”

“Give it one day, then," Hank insisted. "Which, by the way, you seem quite eager to spend alone with him.”

“Don’t you think if there were a better option I’d take it?”

“Since when did babysitting him became the best option, when your sister needs you?”

And there it was, the old festering wound. The cut that never scarred, for either of them.

“Don’t make this about Raven now. I could make it about her but I chose not to.”

“You chose... what does that even mean?”

Charles breathed. There was many a way to put it, and none sounded enough even in his own head. “When she couldn’t trust me, she trusted you.”

“But that wasn’t... That was just a crush!”

Realization dawning on Hank’s face wasn’t pretty nor welcome, while long-awaited.

“You spoke to her heart once, you can try again. Better than I ever could.”

Hank shook his head in disbelief. “You’re sending me to stop her because you think I’m still in love with her.”

“I’m sending you to stop her because I know you love her, and I know you love me, and I trust you to come back to me in one piece.”

“While you nurse his royal pain in the ass back to his arrogant self?”

Charles put his head in his hands. “This is ridiculous.”

Hank scoffed. “Finally we see eye to eye.”

“He wasn’t there. All this time, he wasn’t there. You were.”

“So what? Do I get seniority benefits?” Hank took a deep breath. “You know this is not about being jealous.”

“You are being jealous,” Charles callously pointed out.

“Still,” Hank insisted “I’m afraid you’re going to let him in and he’s going to break your heart. Again.”

Charles groaned. “Let him in?”

“You took the antidote to the serum and went right into his mind without batting an eye. “

“Because somebody had to. We certainly couldn’t keep banging his head waiting for him to recalibrate.”

Hank raised his eyebrows significantly.

Charles sighed. “You know what I think?”

“Let’s hear it.”

“You’re not really afraid of Erik breaking my heart. You wish you could do the same. But you can’t, Hank. That’s not what you are.”

Hank's lips curled into a wry smile. “You don’t know that.”

“Trust me, I read minds.”

“Oh, shut up.”

“Make me.”

“Oh, no, you don’t,” Hank said, even as he closed the distance between them. “I don’t want to take part in your petty revenge sex plan to get back at the love of your life next door.”

_Love of my life?_ Charles arched an eyebrow. “I was about to suggest he watches.”

***

It started as a feeling low in his gut, grounding him as there was a weight attached to his navel pulling him down into the mattress. Ghost fingers trailed up his chest to his sternum, splayed above his collarbones.

Erik welcomed the familiar dream spreading his legs wider, giving into the sensation of strong, sturdy hands lifting them up. It was not a touch he recognized, though solid and soft and pleasant in its own way.

The lips, full and teasing, he recognized. The way they sucked bruises on his neck that would surely be there by morning, the way they wrapped around him making him a whimpering mess, eager to reciprocate.

And reciprocate he did, giving as good as he got, and abandoned himself to the touches reaching deep inside him, until he was so full it had to hurt, and instead made the bed writhing with him in pleasure.

His hands, reaching with a sort of wild helplessness between his legs, were directed to the headboard above, and there they curled, shaping the brass anew, and Erik came with a shout, untouched.

***

If there was one thing that could seriously help with his cranky mood – in no way improved by the obscene noises coming from upstairs all through the night – that was tormenting the only other person in the house apparently not involved in the making of said noises.

“Rise and shine, bub!” he cheered, giving in to theatrics while throwing the curtains open. “Feeling any better?”

The young-ish Magneto cracked one bleary eye open and rolled it, which had to require some very specific mutation for assholes to accomplish. And he actually clutched the blanket tighter and pulled it over his face with a groan, which was kind of adorable. And ultimate blackmailing material. Logan wondered if he could find a Polaroid fast enough.

“Except from feeling like Beast fucked me into the mattress three times in a row? Magnificent.”

“Tell me about it. The walls here are not exactly soundproofed.”

Magneto lowered the blanket, apparently surrendering to sunlight. “Aren’t you supposed to be leaving for Paris?”

“Right now, I’m supposed to knock you out cold if you try something funny.”

“I thought Charles was already taking care of that.”

“He is,” Logan said, wondering if it was better to leave it at that. “But he’s also trying to locate Raven before we leave.”

And with that, Logan thought he was definitely awake. “Cerebro,” Erik breathed.

Another thing that would have been utterly endearing on everyone else, and unfortunately had no considerable worth as blackmailing material for the old Magneto, was the sheer trepidation the young Magneto utterly failed to conceal as they waited for Charles and Hank to re-emerge from the basement.

He kept flexing his hands, as if that might give him an answer as to how much control Charles's mind still retained on him, and his legs, swung over the side of the couch, jittered in a way that made Logan want to kick him in the shins (more than usual, anyway).

When they did emerge from the basement, Charles gave Logan a curt nod, one hand curled white around a wheel, shaking slightly.

The goodbyes were over quick – if you excluded the way Chuck had pulled down Hank and made a close examination of his tonsils – and soon they were off to Paris, Hank taking once again his place at the wheel.

This once, Logan could enjoy the silence and doze off without worrying about being woken up by arguments about mutant supremacy, and he took plenty of advantage from that. When he woke up, though, he could see Hank glancing at him from time to time with that open young gaze that had never truly faded across the years, and he thought he might as well indulge that curiosity, as long as it kept to harmless topics.

Surprisingly, the only question Hank asked was about himself. Unsurprisingly, the topic was far from harmless.

“In the future, do I make it?”

“No,” Logan said simply. Sugar-coating took you only that far and, for all he knew, the totality of his friends and loved ones could be gone by now. He was walking a fine line himself, setting out on a gambit to stop one of the deadliest assassins he knew with the only help of Lab Boy 1.0.

Hank’s expression twisted into one of displeasure, but not quite the grieving one Logan had expected.

“I knew it,” he exclaimed, shaking his head. “That’s where all that ‘you and Erik together’ bullshit comes from.”

***

Finding the pension Charles had described, the one with the half peeled off sign in a little winding alley far off from the center, was relatively easy. Finding the room was easier: Raven’s smell was unmistakable, pointing them straight into the right direction.

The hardest part began when the door creaked open and her lean figure appeared in the doorway, eyes widening in recognition, skin rippling back to its natural state.

“Hank?”

“Were you expecting someone else?”

Raven recovered quickly from the shock, her brow furrowing in thought as she closed the door behind herself and walked into the room.

“Well, Charles, maybe. Looks like its jurisdiction. ‘Keep Raven From Doing Stupid Stuff’.”

Hank smiled. Trust Raven to know when they came for her. “Well, too bad they sent the ‘Talk Raven into Doing Stupid Stuff’ committee then.”

“I missed you,” she said, and though it sounded sincere, it still felt a bit like a kick in the stomach. Then she leaned into him, throwing one arm around his shoulders, and he guessed it would be a head butt (that or a kick in the balls), but he looped his arms around her in return, silencing the voice in his head that sounded just like Charles’s.

“Me too.”

When she pulled away, he saw it in her eyes before he heard it in her voice.

“But you won’t stop me.”

The fight or flight instinct. She just needed to decide which it would be this time.

“You sure about that?”

Raven whipped around, finding the source of the new voice and pinning Logan to the wall.

Hank thanked the fact that Logan had come with him. Otherwise, he wasn’t so sure he would have found the strength to pull this off by himself.

Raven didn’t look as grateful when she noticed the syringe sticking from her upper thigh a moment too late. Unfortunately for her, there was nothing she could do about that. Not in the next five minutes, at least.

Logan and he had to bodily maneuver her unmoving limbs to sit her on the couch.

“I’m sorry about this, Raven, I really am,” Hank began, eyes pleading. “But you wouldn’t have listened otherwise, would you?”

Raven’s eyes, moving feverishly from him to Logan, promised something much more darker than words could ever hope to convey. Hank steeled himself and carried on.

“I need you to stop for a minute and consider the consequences of your actions. If you kill Trask now, you won’t stop his project from becoming a reality. It won’t stop the fear, it will justify it.”

“He… tortured… them…” she seethed, biting out the words with evident effort. “Like… animals.”

“And he’ll pay for this.”

Raven stared down at him hard, unflinching.

“I’m not asking to wait, to bid our time like Charles would,” Hank said, seizing his chance and praying these last few minutes would be enough. “I’m asking you to think your next move through. Trask is building his machines, his Sentinels, because he fears us. What if his Sentinels turned out to be far more dangerous than the mutants he so fears?”

***

Being alone with Erik wasn’t at all the pleasure Hank seemed to be worried about.

For one, Erik seemed far too at ease with their current arrangement, as if a stay at Westchester Manor right after his break out had been planned out and expected. Secondly, Erik didn’t seem to mind having Charles there with him at all. He didn’t seem to mind having Charles in his mind at all. He didn’t seem to mind the casual touches as they passed each other by in the kitchen, the unintended brushing of fingers handing plates over the table, of shoulders and thighs as they sat on the couch waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Thirdly (Charles wished he could say lastly, but wasn’t sure he could afford that), Erik seemed to think impossible that Charles might have a romantic life beyond himself.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you, Erik, but it appears there are people who care about me.”

“Hank?!” Erik scoffed. “Please, he would just run off into the sunset with your sister, if he could.”

“You mean like you did?”

The television spared Erik from finding an answer to that, as the opening titles of breaking news suddenly teared into the merry-go-round of carefree commercials with blaring urgency.

_“Panic hit the Paris Peace Accords today, as a non-identified individual – labelled “mutant” – made an attempt on the life of American scientist Dr. Trask…”_

“Fuck,” Charles exhaled, air knocked out of his lungs in an instant, eyes glued helplessly to the images rolling on the screen. Feeling the spark of amusement emanating from Erik beside him didn’t help.

“Looks like your boyfriend also has a gift for fucking things up.” He turned to him, a smug smile on his lips which Charles resolutely ignored. “You might consider having a type.” Erik’s voice faded on the last syllables, probably as a consequence of the images currently being transmitted along with the report of the attack.

_“… Holding the scientist at gunpoint, the mutant claimed to be acting in retaliation to Trask Industries experiments exploiting…”_

“That’s not Raven,” Erik said, eyeing the green mutant on screen dubiously.

“Yes, it is,” Charles found himself replying with absolute certainty, the seed of an idea steadily taking roots inside his chest.

_“… The local police managed to chase away the assailant and is currently leading a search…”_

“And it’s brilliant.”

***

The call couldn’t come through soon enough.

He felt Erik tense at his side, and right after that, though jarring enough in the quiet of the room to startle him, came the much awaited ring. He swatted Erik’s hand away from the telephone, leaning into him a bit to put the receiver to his ear. Erik sagged further into the couch, accommodating his shoulder to the new weight without a flinch.

“Charles?” Hank’s voice, the little quiver in the otherwise steady and transparent syllables, flooded Charles with warmth.

“It’s me. I saw the news. Is she alright?”

“She’s here. Do you want to talk to her?”

Charles hesitated. It had been so long. His heart beat to the rhythm of a wild _yes, yes, please, I miss you, please, tell me anything, I need to hear your voice_ , but his mind remembered Raven’s face on the beach, the frustration of always being underestimated by her own brother, the elation at finally being free to set on her own path.

A rustle on the other end was followed again by Hank’s voice, “Never mind, she’s playing the game where the phone is lava.”

Charles sighed. “It’s alright. I’d… probably end up saying the worst thing at the worst time ever.” A pause. “Listen, I’ve…” he started again, at the same time as Hank was saying, “I think I’ve got…”

Charles chuckled. “Ok, you go first.”

Charles could almost hear Erik rolling his eyes beside him, and hid his smile in the receiver.

“Alright, so…," Hank started over "I think I’ve got a plan to solve this Trask thing once and for all. How’s the human magnet doing?”

“Not a human,” Erik grumbled unhelpfully.

“He’s well enough to split hairs over taxonomy,” Charles answered.

“I wouldn’t know,” came Logan’s voice from the other side. “He tends to champion that one to his last breath.”

Erik raised one eyebrow conspicuously, nodding at the telephone, for once apparently agreeing to someone else’s opinion. Charles nudged him with the refrain of The Quotations’ worst cover memory provided – on repeat, for good measure – which had him groaning in record time.

“Hank, do tell us about your plan.”

***

Charles’s head whipped in the opposite direction as soon as he realized Erik had caught him looking.

_Please, look your fill._

Erik zipped the pants and bent to retrieve the jacket and cap from the unconscious guard on the ground. He thought he had heard a frustrated noise when he had decided to forgo the logo-ed shirt, but when Erik had glanced his way, Charles had proved to be entranced by a loose thread in the seam of his own coat.

_Is the disguise really necessary?_

_You have this_ , Erik tapped a finger to his own temple, _and I have this._ He pulled the cap down over his eyes.

_Terrible fashion sense?_

Besides, he had been able to listen in on Charles listing all of the viable option for dinner for the last hour or so, and he doubted that had been a conscious sharing. He knew better than to tax him more than necessary.

Erik slipped out from their hiding spot at the edge of the assembling site and made his way to the covered trucks hosting the reclined bodies of the Sentinels.

_Ready to pull up the schematics?_

_I’m ready when you are._

Usually, working his powers into something creative was a joy in its own right. It was treading a fine line between raw power and minute control. At the same time, he found he could lose himself into the space between the tiniest particles, becoming one with the matter he was wielding.

With Charles it was different. There was another edge to things, a peaceful hum accompanying his movements, encouraging and chiding in turns. Every push and pull was carefully negotiated, a thread they spun together.

It was always over so soon.

_Someone’s coming. Are you done?_

_Almost there_ , Erik replied, snaking thin wires up the last of the Sentinel.

_Erik._ Charles’s voice was a warning in his ear.

_Done_ , Erik confirmed, and the warm presence at the back of his head suddenly slipped away.

_Charles!_ Erik called out, dread filling up the space where the warmth had been. _Charles, what happened?_

The way back to the hiding spot seemed twice as long, and when at last he got to where Charles sat in his wheelchair, unconscious but alive, breathing, breathing, breathing, Erik felt like he could breathe again too.

***

Hank was ready to take back every feeling of gratitude he had ever had about Logan’s presence by the time some wicked chance had him pick their rooms at the motel.

“Two rooms, a single and a double.”

“Wait, did he say double?”

“A single and a twin!”

The porter looked at Logan dead in the eye. “Twin or double?”

“What d’you say, sweetheart?”

The woman glanced at him and Raven and handed Logan two keys without another word.

Logan led the way upstairs, stopping by the door of his own room and throwing Raven the key to theirs.

Needless to say, their room was not a twin.

“LOGAN!” Raven cried out, then turned to cast Hank a murderous stare. “I swear, Hank, if you dare say the words…”

Hank eyed her hesitantly. “I’ll take… the chair?”

Hostilities broke out.

The casualties counted: two pillows, whose content was shed in equal parts on the bed and on the floor carpeting.

Raven dropped the pillowcase from her hands and dived onto the duvet. Then she glanced at him with a raised eyebrow, her eyes threatening an encore if he didn’t lie down on the other side.

Raven raised herself on one elbow, studying him silently for a minute before she spoke.

“So how’s life with Charles?”

She laughed heartily at his impression of a deer in the headlights. “You’re wearing Charles’s favorite cologne. That’s a clear message if I’ve ever seen one,” she explained. “And now you’re blushing. Boy, you’ve got it bad.” She poked him in the chest with a delighted chuckle. When her laugh subsided, his finger began tracing lazy circles on Hank’s shirt, raising goosebumps on his skin.

“You know,” she said “when I first saw you, in Paris, I thought, here we go again. I try to make a difference and the good guys come and tell me to look at the bright side… But then... you cheated. You took me off-guard and… and I was so angry…”

“I noticed,” Hank chuckled.

“And I hated you, really.” She marked her words by stabbing her finger into Hank’s chest. “But you surprised me.”

“Are you saying you agreed because I stuck a syringe into your thigh?”

Raven moved away her finger and rolled onto her back, staring at the ceiling. “I’m saying I agreed because I saw you playing dirty. If Hank McCoy isn’t playing by the rules, I thought, he must have a pretty good reason for that.” She turned to look at him again. “Do you think it’s going to work?”

Hank regarded her pensively. “I think only one person knows the answer to that question.”

***

Charles jerked awake a few hours later, arms flailing under the weight of the sheets and mind latching desperately onto Erik’s even before his eyes recognized the familiar walls.

Erik tugged on the thread tying them to each other and sent, _Home_. Strange how the notion made his chest tighten.

Charles’s gaze focused on him and he frowned.

“You’re still here.”

“Where else did you think I’d be?”

“I don’t know, flying off with your newly acquired means of mass destruction or something.” An exhausted Charles meant the bitterness came unbidden, and Erik would have lied if he said he hadn't been waiting for it with open arms. “That _does_ sound like you.”

“Don’t give me ideas.” Erik sat down on the bed, his thigh almost brushing Charles’s unresponsive leg through the bedsheets.

“So you’re back to normal,” Charles said in a flat tone. The warm presence in Erik’s head receded slowly, almost as an afterthought.

“Is that reluctance I feel?” Erik teased, smiling at the scowl on Charles’s face.

“How long till we go live?”

Erik checked his watch, slowly caressing the ticking hands with his powers while his eyes took in the deep shadows under Charles’s. “About eight hours.”

“We’d better get going, then.”

***

_“My fellow Americans, today, we face the greatest threat in our history: mutants. We have prepared for this threat”_ came the President’s voice from the speakers.

Hank touched her arm. “They’re here.”

_“In the immortal words of Robert Oppenheimer, ‘Behold. The world will never be the same again.’”_

Even without his words, Raven would have guessed only moments later, when the giant star-spangled banners dropped revealing two rows of towering Sentinels, and the crowd cheered at the sight of bright eyes lighting up and huge feet stomping forward.

The people on the podium, until then perfectly still in hieratic contemplation of the President’s words, were now in a flurry of activity. Someone, sensing the impending danger, had already moved Nixon to the back, and Raven saw Hank and Logan strain their ears to catch the words Trask was whispering to the Major Stryker’s ear over the din.

_They believe it to be a malfunctioning_ , came a familiar voice in her mind. A look in Hank and Logan’s direction confirmed that the conversation was shared.

_Charles_ , she said.

_Hello, Raven_ , the voice replied with warmth, before resuming the tense, practical tone from before.

_The Sentinels are trained on every moving target, human or mutant, so spread out and be careful. If you can’t disable them, make it look like it. Erik will take care of the rest._

_And who will take care of him?_ , Raven thought, and from the look of it, that was exactly what Hank had been thinking.

_Why, I will_ , Charles replied, but by then she was already running towards the nearest Sentinel in a flurry of blue, feeling light and proud.

***

“It certainly looks like the worst week of Bolivar Trask’s life,” commented the man behind the shiny desk with an ironic smile, introducing the news. “After the attempt on his life at the Paris Peace Accords last Saturday, when a mysterious green-skinned individual attacked Trask over the alleged accusation of having experimented on and tortured mutants, it seems that Trask’s entire career has met its end today at the hands of the same technology he has been developing to fight mutants. Trask’s prototypes, the Sentinels, have appeared to go berserk during the official presentation introduced by the President himself and counting over eight thousand people, among whom twenty-three were injured. There were no victims, thanks to the timely intervention of the police force and a few mutants who helped taking down the faulty protot…”

“Pietro!” Mom’s long-suffering call echoed through the walls.

“What?”

“Dishes!”

Pietro sighed, gingerly standing from the carpet and trudging his way to the kitchen.

“And don’t make it look like a death sentence. You’d be done in a minute if you wanted to.”

In the meantime, a new still had appeared on the screen: the blue face of young woman with blood-red hair and eyes like those of a cat.

“You could say a new hero has risen, Carl,” a young woman told the man behind the shiny desk with a delighted voice.

“A new hero for a new time, Susan,” he replied.

A hero with strange hair and strange eyes and strange skin. Curling a lock of hair around his finger, Lorna decided she liked the sound of that.

***

“I don’t want to come home,” was the first thing Raven said to him, looking him straight in the eyes.

He stared right back, biting his lip and hoping the smile would come through someway. “And that’s alright.”

“No, it’s not,” she said, and buried her face in his hair before a tear could poke its way out of her eyes. Charles looped his arms around her shoulder and held tight, trying to convey all that he felt through touch and pressure alone. “But you have so many people who love you and care for you, Charles… and so many brothers and sisters out there, waiting for you to find them… don’t ever think you are alone.”

“I won’t.”

She squeezed tighter before she pulled away, a little smile dancing at the corner of her bright eyes.

“Thank you,” she said, stepping back further. _Thank you for not letting me become a murderer. Thank you for finding a way. Thank you for not asking me to go back. Thank you for not looking into my head._ It could be any and all of that, and it didn’t really matter, as long as Charles knew she was happy and free.

Raven nodded at Logan, gave an half smile at Hank and pointedly ignored Erik, and then gone was her blue skin and luscious red hair. A petite old lady with a silver braid tipped her floppy hat back and left without another glance in their direction, her bright colored floral dress fluttering about her.

Wiping away the traces of this goodbye from his cheeks, Charles turned to face the next.

A few steps away, Erik was surveying the cleaning operations with a far-off gaze – or, more probably, doing a bit of cleaning of his own, silently tucking away every bit of wire that could be traced back to him. When he was satisfied with his work, he turned and walked up to him.

“You behaved,” Charles said.

Erik flashed him a smile. “It won’t happened twice.”

“Well then, until your next headline.”

_Not even going to kiss me goodbye?_

_You may recall I’m in a relationship._

_Trying desperately to prove a point there, eh, Charles?_

_Promises are still valued by someone._

Erik's smile turned lopsided. _I’ve never made you any promises. I’ve never broken them._

_Perhaps it would be easier to forgive you if you had._

_You’re not making any sense._

_Good. I’m finally on your level._

“So I guess this is it. Pity.” If he had a cape, something purple and hideous like the one he had been wearing when he had been arrested, Erik would probably have wounded it up around himself and turned away dramatically. As it was, he only turned on his heels and made a show of walking away.

_You could always make me do it. Put the blame on me, leave unscathed._

_I could,_ Charles smiled, _but I won’t._

Charles turned the chair and pushed on the wheels, only to find them stuck in place after half a turn. The chair detached from the ground and rearranged itself in front of Erik.

Charles watched the battle between longing and pride from the outside, reveling in every subtle change, every little line appearing on and disappearing from Erik’s face, until the battle was over and Erik was too close to tell apart the old lines from the new.

_You’re unnerving_ , sent Erik with a shiver, when Charles grazed his bottom lip with his teeth. _Every time’s like the first with you._

_Yeah, clumsy and overeager. Are you going to use that tongue or not? No wonder Raven dumped you._

_For the last time…_

_Yeah, whatever._ Then lower, though still pointedly addressed to Erik, _Platonic my ass._

His remark evaporated quickly, replaced by a buzz of satisfaction.

Erik grinned wickedly against his lips. _Not bad, right?_

_Mediocre at best. I taught you that one._

_Well, excuse me if I didn’t go to fucking college._

At last they parted, Erik smiling his most charming self-deprecating smile.

_You got what you wanted._

_There you are, always assuming our desires are the same._

_Aren’t they though?_

_What I want is for this not to be the last time I see you._

_Mediocre, uh?_   “Goodbye, Charles.”

“Goodbye, old friend.”

Erik spread his hands, palms up, and raised himself off the ground.

_There’s room for improving_ , Charles thought, and a warm chuckle resonated in the confines of his head, keeping him company even when the dark shape into the distance became no more than a dot and then disappeared.

Charles rolled over to where Hank was, contemplating the disaster – or lack thereof – around them, and reached out to him with a hand.

“Will you ever get over it?”

Hank took it with a wry smile. “The kiss? Yes. Erik not fucking things up for once? Sure as hell not.” _He’s not half bad a kisser, though._

Charles chuckled. _No need to inflate his ego._

“Someone care to tell me what the fuck I’m supposed to be doing here?”

They turned to find a dumbfounded Logan trying to make sense of the overturned chairs and torn banners, the fizzling carcasses of the Sentinels, the semi-deserted lawn dominated by the White House.

_Does this mean it worked?_ Hank asked.

_That, or the future is well and truly screwed._

“Logan,” Charles called out to him, approaching. “I was just thinking of offering you a position in our school. How do you feel about art?”  
  
  



End file.
